Do You Read the FAQ?

What does it say about someone who never reads the FAQ of a site but dives in headfirst attempting to use it without knowing what they are doing?

For some reason that describes me… which seems a little weird considering I usually read the instructions before trying to assemble something. Actually, in my real life, I look both ways before crossing the street, I follow the instructions when cooking or baking, I’ve even helped to write a couple of FAQs but for some reason when it comes to Social Media or Networking I just assume I know how to use it and jump right in.

I’m still sending links in Plurk using the whole URL instead of the special way to create links in Plurk. It’s not that I don’t want to know how to do it I just can’t seem to find the time to prioritize finding out. Or how about the fact that I just discovered that you can Stumble your friend’s Stumbles by using a special “Friend” button in the SU toolbar even though I have been using SU since Aug 2007? I still haven’t joined any groups yet either because I really don’t know what their purpose is.

Now some sites are inherently easy to use. They are intuitive so this method of jumping right in is quite acceptable. But nowadays most sites put a spin on the way they work to make themselves different from all the other social sites out there. This creates a bit of a problem. If you aren’t reading the instructions how are you going to get the most out of the site?

Do I have a problem? Are there others of you out there like me? Should we form a support group? I’m not the only one… right?